Samhain and the Wild Huntress

To mark the (slightly over) one year of me submitting stories to this site, I thought I would do a Halloween special. The origins of this story began with a play on the High Plains Drifter / Pale Rider westerns, but as I began to write it up, I had a slightly better idea. So I stirred in a little sprinkle of Folk Lore and a song I was listening to on the radio, and put this together. I am not expecting this to be a bestseller, just a short story idea I had while chatting to a few friends from this site, but I am fairly pleased with the result. I hope everyone else enjoys it as well.

I would like to thank Valerie for adding a little depth to the main character, and also to thank Wax Philosophical for being there to bounce the ideas off.

***

Foreword.

Many centuries ago, the Celts celebrated a festival called Samhain. This marked the end of summer and the beginning of the darker days of winter, a time associated with death. It was believed that during the night of this festival, the barriers between the world of the living, and the world of the dead was at its thinnest, allowing the dead to cross from their world in to ours. To prevent the dead from returning to their family's homes, the living would leave offerings of honey and mead outside their houses, to keep the spirits occupied until morning, when they would have to return to their own world.

The living of present times celebrate a festival called Halloween, which has a very firm foothold in its origins of Samhain, but in some places the original tradition is still maintained, over two thousand years after its peak.

***

The evening breeze swept in off the Sonoran Desert, bringing with it the usual airborne dust that would cover the veranda of Val's Bar once again. With a sigh Valerie Moss pushed her broom across the warped, wooden boards that made up the porch of the bar, that had been her mothers, and her grandmothers before that. Of course back then the main highway had run right past the small plot of dirt it was built on, and nearly every night had been a busy night. Sadly, while Val was still a child, a new highway had been built and what had been a main road turned in to a dirt track inside a year. Now, the only custom Val got these days, were her few remaining regulars, and the occasional tourist who had wondered off the beaten track, and they only stayed long enough to look around the old place before leaving.

There was a part of her that was tempted to move on before she ended up like her mother, shackled to the desolate bar by fate. It wasn't like she hadn't had the opportunity, a local industrial company had been trying to buy the land the bar was on, but the price they had offered was a fraction of what it was worth, and the offer had been turned down more than once. The last few weeks however had gotten harder, especially since someone had been vandalising the outside of the building. The sign on the roof now stated the bar belonged to 'al' instead of 'Val' and several of the front windows had to be boarded up after the glass was broken.

As the Sun dipped below the horizon, two figures, as aged and dishevelled as the bar, shuffled across the dusty road and up to where Val was fighting a lost battle against the desert. The two friends had been coming to the bar every night as long as Val could remember. Both of them had white hair, one, whose tanned scalp showed through the strands of white, and couldn't manage a full sentence without using at least one swear word, and the other, a Native American who claimed the entire area had belonged to his tribal.

"Dullahan. Chief Muut." Val welcomed. "Go right in. I'll be there in a minute."

"Dunno, why you botherin' Val." Dullahan grumbled. "Fekkin dust'll come quicker than'y can move it."

"Some battles are worth fighting, even if you're losing them." Val replied with a short laugh. After all the years, she still had no idea where the two old guys lived. They just wandered in from the desert at the same time every day, no matter what the weather.

"Like the one with the white men from the City?" Muut asked. "The coyotes told me it was them that broke your windows."

A spark of anger flared inside Val. She had suspected the lawyers from StripeTech had been getting someone to cause problems around the bar, in an effort to encourage the sale of the land. Chief Muut's words just added a little salt, stoking her anger. It was times like this when she wished that she had kept in touch with her old school friends, at least that way she would have someone to call on for advice. As it was, Chief Muut would no doubt offer to take their scalps, and Dullahan would tell her to do something anatomically impossible for her.

Cursing the dust, Val propped the broom against the wall, giving up on that particular battle and went to serve the customers she still had.

"Ah your bloody cheatin' me again ag'in you'ld fox bastit." Dullahan's course accent was very audible over the music from the jukebox, a relic from the seventies, only had one playable record remaining, a track called 'Don't fear The Reaper', that was so well played, it was nearly worn out.

Val didn't even bother to lift her head from the book she was reading. She had heard the same words nearly every night. The two old timers sat at the same table every night, playing cards for pennies. Dullahan tossing back shots of rye, and Chief Muut sipping coffee that had gone cold hours before.

"Can I git 'nother bottle Val?" Dullahan shouted. "An' don't ye forget to put out an offerin'"

Val frowned as she dragged a fresh bottle of cheap booze from under the counter. "Offering?" She asked.

"Yea, an offerin'." Dullahan muttered. "Tis Samhain. We dinna wan any deed comin'."

Nodding, Val remembered it was Halloween, or as Dullahan called it Samhain. She assumed that was what is was called from where ever he had originated from. Although she didn't know where that was, just as she had no idea where they disappeared to in the early hours when they left the bar.

Halloween had meant a steady stream of customers on their way to parties in various costumes. Now it just meant that Val would step outside and place a shot glass of rye on the window ledge. Admittedly, the glass was always empty in the morning. Val suspected that Dullahan drank it on his way out, but as the old fellow paid for it she didn't care either way.

Sighing, Val returned to her stool and her book, taking a swig from a bottle of beer.

The window next to the door exploded inwards, scattering glass across the floor, as a fist sized rock bounced on the dusty boards.

Cursing, Val snatched the cut down twelve gauge from under the bar and ran to the door, but the darkness of the night hid everything more than a few yards from her veranda.

More annoyed that the last surviving window had been smashed, than anything else, Val cursed and snatched the broom from where she had left it earlier, and began to sweep up the glass fragments, the broken shot glass amongst them.

As she contemplated tacking a canvas sheet over the broken window, Val wondered if it was worth getting a glazier to come out and replace the glass, or would they just get broken again the next night. Deciding to not bother, she returned to her book, only to stop half way as she heard a deep throated thudding noise approach from out of the dark night. It wasn't unknown to get a vehicle travelling down their road. Most of them passed straight by as they continued their journey to their destination, but this one seemed to be slowing as it approached. Sure enough the light from a motorcycle eased past the open door and halted. The rumbling continued for a second or two, then cut off suddenly, making the scratchy music seem louder.

Three pairs of eyes fixated on the doorway as footsteps scuffed the wooden steps and a figure appeared in the doorway.

She was tall. That was Val's first thought. Dusty was the second. If it hadn't been for the motorcycle, Val would have said the woman in the doorway had stepped out of a western. She was dressed as a cowboy, from her boots to the unbelievable Stetson jammed firmly on her head. Every item of clothing was coated in a later of dust, from the leather jeans to the long duster coat that hung to mid-calf. The lower half of her face was obscured by a neckerchief, no doubt to filter the road dust out of her mouth and nose.

"Come in." Val greeted. "Please don't worry about the dust, it gets everywhere anyhow."

The woman clumped across the floor, unbuttoning the coat as she walked, and Val was slightly disappointed to see there wasn't a holstered colt on her hip.

With the coat unbuttoned, the woman tugged the scarf from around her neck, revealing pale skin underneath. The upper half of her face was encrusted with the same yellow dust, apart from rings around both light grey eyes, where Val assumed she had worn some protection.

"Do you have a cold beer?" She asked. Her voice, while deep and husky, had a soft and light accent. Her lips looked dry and parched, which wasn't surprising, as it looked as though she had crossed the desert, not travelled along a road.

"Sure." Val smiled warmly, popping the cap off a bottle straight from the cooler, and placing it on the bar.

The bottle left the bar and touched thin lips. A moment later the empty bottle returned to the bar, and a pink tongue snaked out, leaving a clean patch around her mouth.

"Another?" Val asked, holding up and second bottle.

"Thanks." The stranger said taking a long pull from the second bottle. "That's better." She gasped, her voice a little less husky, but still fairly deep. Half turning, she touched her fingers to the brim of the Stetson, acknowledging the two card players, who had been staring ever since she had entered the bar. "Gentlemen."

Dullahan and Chief Muut returned to their game, throwing occasional sideways glances and the newcomer. Which wasn't surprising, Val surmised. She was very good looking, even with the layer of dust coating her clothing.

"Do you have a washroom?" The stranger asked. "I can't remember the last time I washed."

A feeling that Val hadn't had in many years fluttered through her chest. Something she hadn't felt since she quite collage to help run the bar, ending the brief relationship she had been in. The face of Susanna jumped painfully in to her memory. She had been tall, blonde and her family had owned a ranch where they bred horses. And she had been Val's only real love interest.

"Only the one out back." Val found herself replying. "But your more than welcome to use my bathroom upstairs if you like. I could rustle you up some food while you clean up."

"That would be swell. Thanks"

Val escorted the woman behind the bar and up the creaking stairs. Once at the top she opened the door to the bathroom, where rested an iron tub with a rickety looking shower head over it.

"Sorry it isn't much." Val apologised. "The water won't be hot, but it is clean."

"Seriously, this is great. You've been more than kind." The woman told her forming her thin lips in a tight smile.

"My pleasure." Val told her, returning the smile. "I'll just go get you a towel."

As Val rummaged through the linin chest for a decent towel, she paused, wondering what on earth had possessed her to let this woman, who's name she didn't even know, use her bathroom. Still, she mused, it didn't hurt to be friendly, and if all it cost was a few gallons of water, who cared.

Armed with a clean white towel, Val opened the bathroom door and stopped dead in her tracks, heat touching her face in embarrassment.

The stranger was stood in the tub, water cascading down from the shower rose, washing dust and grime away from her naked skin. Wet, dull blonde hair reached half way down her back, plastered to her wet skin. Her eyes were closed and she seemed totally oblivious to Val's presence.

Feeling like a voyeur, Val told herself she should walk away, but she just couldn't tear her eyes away from the woman's body. There was something amazingly erotic about how the water ran over her shoulders, down her back to caress her smooth round flesh of her behind. Every cell of Val's soul screamed at her to leave the towel and exit the bathroom, but her body just refused to obey, and her eyes remained glued to the woman in the shower.

Enticingly slowly, she began to turn around. Val's breath caught in her throat as she watched the stream of water cascade downwards, following the contours of the shapely shoulders to form small rivers that trickled over a pair of small, rounded breasts. Drips of crystal clear water clung to tight pink nipples, made sharp from the caress of the cold water.

In another world, Val would have undressed and got in the shower with the intoxicating woman, but a lifetime of uncertainty and lack of self-confidence stayed her hand. Instead she remained clothed and her eyes followed the drips that appeared on the very tip of the nearest nipple only to fall in to a rivulet that meandered its way across a stomach, flat with defined toned muscles, to join a larger torrent that flowed over a sparse growth of wet blonde hair between her legs.

With her eyes drawn to that spot, Val slowly let out the breath she had been unconsciously holding. The blonde stranger moaned softly as a hand with long strong looking fingers, ran over one of those perky breasts, plucking at the cold hard nipple, then rolling it between her fingers.

Val's own breasts and nipples ached in sympathy with the action, as she felt her body react to the show that appeared to be acted out just for her entertainment. A yearning heat, initiated by her own lustful thoughts began to warm her loins, as the stranger ran her other hand across the ridges of the muscled stomach.

Simultaneously praying that the errant hand would halt its progress, and also continue towards its destination, Val gritted her teeth, not daring to make a sound, least the amatory show be interrupted.

One of the long fingers brushed over the tuft of pale hair, deliberately and unhurriedly, touching the spot where the hair parted making a gentle, slow circle.

The thin pale lips of the stranger's mouth parted slightly and a shallow gasp of breath, barely heard over the noise of the running water, touched Val's ears. The warmth that made her cheeks flush, had spread through her entire body, and the feeling of physical desire throbbed between her own legs.

The stranger's hand moved further downwards, rubbing and teasing the half hidden opening, while her other hand squeezed and pulled at her breast. The soft moans turned in to slightly loud pants and gasps, as the frequency picked up its pace.

Val had never felt a longing like she was experiencing, the warm tingles had built in to sparks of sensual energy, and she desperately she clenched the towel to her breast, as trying to contain the craving that threatened to burst out of her. One of her own hands dropped away from the precious bundle she clung to, a sinful limb that ran down and across her jeans, wanting to feel the stranger's fingers that were buried from sight, play with her own sex.

With her eyes still screwed shut, the blonde woman threw her head back, as the moans progressed in to low pitched shrieks. Dampness spread around Val's loins, as the woman in the shower cried out her climax in an extended screech that bounced off the walls of the small room.

Shocked by the ferocity of the orgasm, Val took a step backwards and a loose floorboard squealed under her foot.

At the sound of the intrusive noise, the woman's eyes snapped open, piercingly fixing on Val's own stare.

There was a brief second where Val could have sworn the light grey eyes turned as black as the grave. Then the lights all over the bar went out in a series of rapid pops.

Isolated in the darkness, Val panicked. She dropped the towel to the floor and bolted out of the door, her hands guiding her down the stairs and back in to the bar.

With her heart pounding in her chest, Val needed something to steady her nerves. She reached under the counter, for the bottle of whiskey she kept hidden from Dullahan, but her hand closed on emptiness. Swearing, she stepped from behind the bar, intent on retrieving the bottle from the drunken old man.

She paused.

In the darkness, she could just about make out the shape of the table and the two old men still playing cards, oblivious to the lack of light.

Val had no idea what was going on, but something wasn't right. She had known the old guys to play their card game as long as the drinks flowed, but to do it in total darkness was more than strange. And as for what had happened in the bathroom... She shuddered to remember the blackness of the eyes that had chilled her soul.

Footsteps sounded from above. Slow and deliberate. Making their along, then down the stairs.

Her mind raced, and she remembered Dullahan's words about Samhain and if an offering wasn't left the dead would enter the house to terrify the living. Her thoughts jumped to the shotgun and if it would be of any use against a creature from the beyond. The shotgun she kept next to decent bottle of whiskey. On the now empty shelf.

"Valerie." The husky voice spoke from the doorway.

Val turned away from the card players who were still unmindful of what was going on. Fear filled her chest, where moments before desire had reigned. The blonde woman was dressed again in the same clothing, with the lack of light, Val couldn't see if her eyes had returned to normal, or they retained the darkness of the grave.

"I mean you no harm." The woman told her gently. "I've come to help you."

"Who are you?" Val asked, her terror laced voice hardly more than a whisper.

The grey outline of the woman shrugged. "I have many names, but you can call me Gwyn. I want you tell me how long you have lived here Val."

The softness of the voice eased away some of Val's fears, and her thumping chest slowed its beat. The question was strange. She had live her all her life. From when she was born right up until... she suddenly wasn't sure what year it was.

"You don't have to stay here anymore Valerie." Gwyn told her tenderly, as she reached out her hand. "Take my hand."

Something tugged at Val's heart. Half buried memories appeared, only to slip out of her grasp once more. Timidly she extended her arm and her fingers touched the fingers of Gwyn.

A hand as cold as ice gripped her hand and pulled her close. Val half thought about resisting, but the yearning to be touched that had charged her body earlier, filled her once more.

Their lips met in a smothering embrace, banishing the last vestiges of her fear.

Gwyn pulled away from the kiss and placed a cold finger on Val's lips to silence any questions. "I have been looking for you for a long time Valerie. You are of my people, and you were bound to me many years before you were born. At the time of your passing, my kin arrived to guide you to the next world." Gwyn indicated the two card players, who glanced up from their game. "Typically they couldn't decide to whom your soul belonged, so they decided to play cards for it, making sure you placed the Samhain offering to deter anyone one else from claiming you, that held you here in limbo, but now I am here to take you to where you belonged. At my side."

Valerie glance back to the table, finally understanding the nature of her regular customers. Chief Muut and Dullahan smiled back at her, their faces no longer creased with age, and grey hair replaced with dark. An owl swooped through the open door on silent wings, to perch on the now broad shoulder of the Native American.

"I suppose I should thank them really." Gwyn said with a half-smile. "If it wasn't for their actions, protecting this dwelling, you would have crossed and we would have never been together." Gwyn brushed a hand over Valerie's hair tenderly. "If you consent, we can leave now, and you will ride at my side for eternity."